Challenge
by AndAgain
Summary: Going to be two chapters, intended to be a one-shot but ran long! Rated T for one very mild innuendo and gore. Morrigan and Alonathel have a little bet going on. Will this seemingly harmless bit of fun have dire consequences?
1. A Bet of Fun

**A/N: **Ahhh, okay. So, here's attempt two at some DA Fanfiction. A little nervous about writing Zevran, which is why he doesn't really talk until chapter two. I didn't intend to post any of this, but I contracted walking pneumonia and got some time to finish it. I've been working on it slowly for a couple of weeks now. Since I got a favorable reaction to Night Terrors, I kind of figured "eh, what the hell, why not?". Thank you so much two my commenters! You made my day! There might eventually be some art for NT and for this, but it'll be a while in coming. I hope you all like Thel, and the little taste of her backstory this gives!

**-AA**

**M**orrigan had started the bet.  
>Alonathel had just complied.<br>At least, that's what she would say if this all went pear-shaped.  
>Thel was standing awkwardly in the middle of camp, trying to ignore Zevran's blatant appraisal of her form, and Alistair's equally humiliating red-faced silence. She knew she would win. Her dignity was at stake. But she couldn't keep from running through the events that had gotten her into this, in a 'why me?' Kind of way.<p>

Thel was sitting beside the road. Again. Sweat was running in itchy rivulets down her back, her legs, her face. The full force of a Ferelden summer was glaring down at the group from above them, a great golden ball of fire that seemed to burn hotter than a blast of Alistair's holy energy. And that was like being roasted alive to the elven mage.  
>She hiked her long, thick robes up a little higher, beyond any consideration of propriety, revealing pale legs with bronzed feet. It looked ridiculous. Alonathel slumped against a rock, strands of dirty blonde hair escaping her increasingly loose bun to stick, dark with persperation, to her cheeks and slender neck. "Maker," she moaned at no one in particular, "Alistair's kingdom for a bath."<br>"Hey, I think I should get a say in that!" The ex-templar grinned at her half-heartedly. '_He must be boiling in all that metal,_' she looked up at him, gauging his discomfort, before replying,  
>"You're holding up much better than I am."<br>"Practice."  
>"Ahh, but it was always so damn shady in the Tower!" Thel whined, looking at him pitifully. Suddenly, she heard snickering. The mage shot a quick glare in the general direction of Leliana and Zevran, but they looked as innocent as school children. "Yeah, posessed school children..." she muttered, pouting.<p>

Suddenly, a shape blotted out the sun. Thel looked up quickly, reaching reflexively for her gnarled oak staff, which lay nearby, but when her eyes were able to pick out the creature's details, she relaxed. Only Morrgian.  
>"I think," the witch said in oh-so-high-and-mighty tones, "that you are exaggerating. Or, possibly more likely..." here a nod, a raised eyebrow, a smirk, "just weak. Circle training, no doubt." Feral, golden eyes twinkled merrily down at the elf.<p>

_'Adraste's bedslippers, why not?'_

"Like you could do any better!" Thel growled, feigning an aggravation she did not feel. "I'd like to see you try walking miles and miles in this thrice-blasted contraption under that monster!" She shot one arm up into the air, pointing sternly at the sun.

"Is that a challenge?"  
>"It is."<br>"And what, pray tell, should your challenge be?"  
>"Your call."<br>At that, Morrigan smiled visciously. "You, my dear, sweet Warden, are so very modest."  
>"And you, Morri," Thel's grin was just as catlike "are not." Alistair was staring at them now, confusion written accross his face. Leliana was watching with the air of someone keeping score. Zevran, silky hair flowing in a sudden breeze ('How in the name of all that is holy does he keep his hair looking so Maker forbidden amazing?'), was pretending not to pay attention, but Thel could tell he was listening. As Morrigan dramatically contemplated her counterstrike, there was relative quiet, except for the muffled snores of the dwarves in their cart and the quiet chatter between Shale and Sten, who had recently had some kind of bonding moment over a shared hatred of pigeons.<br>"A switch!" The witch proclaimed triumphantly.  
>"Pardon?"<br>"I wear your robes..." she raised that eyebrow again suggestively, "and you wear mine."  
>"Oh." Thel knew she was turning red, but the sunburn was probably concealing it nicely. She stared dumbly at Morrigan's idea of 'robes'. The witch hadn't changed since she'd left the wilds. Then again, she hadn't seemed particularly bothered by the weather, either. This could be interesting<br>"I accept your terms." She said solemnly, concealing another smile. "Tomorrow, we move out in each others' robes. Agreed?"  
>"Agreed"<p>

And here she was, dressed in Morrigan's ridiculously revealing clothing, trying occasionally to pull her skirt down far enough to cover some of the uneven tan she'd aquired over the past few weeks. The black tights hadn't fit. She stood in front of her own tent, waiting with a sour impatience for the witch and the bard to emerge, listening exasperatedly to the occasional cries of,  
>"Ouch!" Or "It's supposed to go there, hold still!", generally followed by swearing in several languages.<br>She endured the stares of the males a moment longer before going after Leliana.  
>It was a sight to be seen.<br>Morrigan was half in the richly embroidered circle robes, trying futilely to belt the overskirt on. The Orlesian bard was pulling violently on the stays of the bodice, one knee in the middle of the witch's back. Thel began to laugh.  
>"What, pray tell, is so amusing, hmm?" Morrigan asked, glaring daggers.<br>"Oh.." Thel bit her tongue and managed to stammer between giggles, "N.. nothing!"  
>She shooed a frustrated Leliana away and gently tugged the cords into place before doing up the buttons and clasping the collar tightly at the witch's throat. "Here, Morri, just let me." Thel jerked the belt taught around Morrigan's waist and smoothed the soft fabric. She took a step back, admiring her handiwork. Swathed in the Circle robes, the witch had lost some of the primitiveness of her appearance and seemed in stead to be regal and poised. Her yellow, feral eyes gave the image an aura of grace and wild, unspeakable power.<br>"_Wow, _you look... like you could be first enchanter..." Leliana said in a hushed tone, mouth a circle of awe.  
>Morrigan turned a funny shade of blotchy pink, and stammered something sarcastic in return.<br>Thel quietly moved the tent-flap out of the way and the witch stomped outside, followed by Leliana and then the elf herself. When he saw them, Alistair's eyes looked like they'd bug out of his head.  
>"Staring, I'm told, is concidered rude." Morrigan shot at him, sneering.<br>"Well," he replied, leaning back and grinning, "Put a bear in a dress, it's still a bear."  
>"I'll give you bear, you insufferable whelp!"<br>"Hey!" Thel shouted, stepping in front of Morrigan. "Break it up, you two." She glared at them both, daring a retort. Neither of them was brainless enough to try. "Now, we're going to march just like usual. Shale, take point. Alistair, Sten guard our rear. Leli, left side, Zevran right. Mages in the middle. Got it?"  
>There was a chorus of acquiescent noises, and shortly afterwards they broke camp and moved out. Most of the attention seemed to shift from Thel's appearance to Morrigan's as they moved, and she was relieved.<br>'_Used to being looked to for leadership, yes. Used to being stared at like an untended pastry? No.'_  
>And she wasn't being stared at, thankfully. Well, not entirely stared at. Zevran seemed to be looking at her out of the corner of his eye in a way that made Thel uncomfortable. She was pretty sure she'd seen that look on his face right before he'd kissed that bandit woman. At the same time as running her through. She shuddered slightly and glanced at him again, this time catching his eye. He turned his head and grinned mischievously. She snapped her gaze back to Shale's shoulders , nose in the air.<p>

A few hours later, the sun began to beat down on them full force. Though she was still sweating like an apostate at a Templar convention, Thel was able to note a pleasant ability to breath and an increase in stamina. She was also rather happy with the small noises of displeasure eminating from the general direction of Morrigan behind her. As they passed burnt-out farmhouses and blackened fields, a chilling reminder of the horde's passing before them, it became increasingly clear that the witch was feeling anything but a drop in temperature.

"Tired, Darling?" Thel called back in a singsong voice as she trotted to the top of a rocky hill, reveling in her freedom.  
>"Not... a bit.." came an exasperated reply. The elf laughed delightedly and spun in a tight circle, grinning.<br>"Isn't it just the best day? I don't know when I've ever felt so free!"  
>"Don't get carried away, Dear" Wynne warned in a serious tone, offset by twinkling eyes, "It's not like this is forever."<br>"Oh... yes, Wynne." Thel nodded respectfully, subdued. They walked on in relative quiet for a few more miles, stopping after an hour or so to eat a quick lunch of bread and cheese. Meunster, according to Alistair. The group then picked up and carried on, walking at a steady pace set by Shale.  
>They could have continued for the remainder of the day, as the sun had begun its slow descent to the horizon and only five hours of daylight remained, but a gutteral growl interrupted the peace of the march with a finality unlike any other.<br>"Halt." Thel hissed, and everyone tensed. Leliana drew her bow, knocking an arrow that crackled and sparked. Zevran put one hand on a dagger, shifting to a relaxed pose that enabled him to move swiftly in any direction. Alistair and Sten drew their swords, and the mages pulled mana from deep within, causing their staves to glow ominously. The spawn were on them in seconds.

A hurlock fell immediately to Alistair's blade, and the group tightened formation. The mages cast spell after spell, protected by the circle of warriors. But a misplaced arrow allowed Leliana to be swept aside, and they were exposed. A shriek took advantage of the opening, surging into the middle of the fight. Wynne, distracted by healing Sten of a concussion, could not aide Morrigan and Alonathel as they fought.  
>Thel spun her staff in an arc, lashing out with a cone of freezing ice, but compensation for a heaviness she no longer had caused her to miss by a wide margin. Morrigan, tangled in the thick robes, couldn't seem to move fast enough to evade the beast, and though she was more than holding her own, the witch was having close calls at an alarming frequency.<br>The elf ground the end of her staff into the thing's eye, causing a spurt of black blood to splash her cheek. It flung out one twisted arm, catching her exposes side on a hooked, jagged claw. She heard a scream, but didn't feel her mouth open, and the ripping noise that came from somewhere close by did not alarm her unduly. The battle seemed to slip away, the chaos still and the clash of swords quieted, the crunch of crushed bone and the slick, sucking noise of daggers entering flesh dulled to a hum. The edges of her vision grew fuzzy, until all was a soft, uniform gray that was strangely comforting.  
><em>'Am I done?<em>' She thought passively. Somehow, the question didn't seem to matter much. _'I'd very much like to be done. It's so quiet here, so peaceful. I'm so tired, Mother. May we stop and rest?_'


	2. Realization

**A/N: **_Here's the second chapter of this two-part one-shot thing. Hope you enjoy it :)_

_I've gotten thirty-some-odd hits on this, only two of which were from people who were logged in. I just want to remind visitors that I have things set so you can comment! Please leave feedback, it makes me feel all warm and fuzzy and helps me to figure out how I'm doing._

_Thanks a ton!_

_-AA_

The first thing she noticed was the light. It pushed its way into her sight, starting at the corners of her vision and eventually blinding her. The table and chairs were gone, masked by the strange glow, and her family was nowhere to be seen.  
>"Mother?" Thel called desperately, reaching her hands out to touch the woman's face. She had been there but a moment ago. "Where have you gone? Where are the twins, Mother? I can't hear them! Weren't they playing outside?" The light seemed to pulse malevolently, and Alonathel hated it for concealing her home. Where was the rough wooden furniture, the green woven rug covered in the strange symbols that she so loved to trace with her toes? "Father? Where are you? Lynna! Lynna, please!" She raised her voice, and the light grew to an intensity that hurt her eyes. She tried to close them, but they would not listen.<br>A strange burning began to register in her mind, distracting her from the light. It became more and more acute, and she traced it to her right side. She tried to move her hands to touch it, but they weren't cooperating any better than her eyes. Suddenly, the burning flared into an unbearable fire, and for a second she thought she saw a face through the light. She didn't recognise the strange person, and through the haze of pain she couldn't call out to him. The world was full of screaming, and of words in a strange language, and none of it made any sense. Thel finally forced her eyes shut, and as the pain receded she slept.

-

The light began to creep into the corner of her eye, but Thel didn't panic. It had come again and again, along with the terrible fire in her side, and then the strange face. Usually the face was a man, sometimes a Shem, sometimes an elf. Once or twice, it had been a woman with strange pointed features and she had said things in a language Thel didn't know. She had begun to be able to make her voice rise above the screaming on occasion, and she had called after the faces, but to no avail. As the light and the pain consumed her again, she allowed herself to drift away.

When it ended, she was in a field. This was one of three places she went after the light, the others being her kitchen and a strange round room full of laughing shemlen speaking in tongues and smiling at her. Sometimes she was a child, sometimes an adolescent. In the field, she was always an adult. Thel lay with her arms crossed behind her head, staring at the blue sky. Daisies on long stems grew all around her, and she loved to watch them sway in the breeze.  
>If she rolled over, she could make out an arm, a nose, a pointed ear between the stalks, and she talked to their owner. Whoever it was never responded, but Thel found their presence comforting.<p>

When the light came again, a while later, Thel felt the fire like she never had before. It burned and stung like a thousand tainted wasps were attacking her, and the screaming was ear-splittingly loud. The light pulsed and grew and yawned wide like a mouth, swallowing her whole.

-

The first thing she saw was green. It was above her, and as it came into focus she realised it was fabric. She raised her head, overcoming a swirling nausea through sheer willpower, and tried to take in her surroundings. In a tent. Surrounded by stacks of bloodied bandages, a bowl of lumpy gruel to her left. The elf raised herself up on her elbows, fighting back another wave of dizziness, and surveyed herself. Covered in a soft brown blanket, arms bruised and covered in tiny scratches. She moved the cloth, and hissed at the sight.  
>Her middle was a mess of tightly bound bandages, stained red-black with blood. It hurt to move. '<em>Why..<em>' she wondered, not understanding. '_Oh. Shriek. Shriek?_'

Memories came flooding back in a head-splitting jumble of sound and color. People, places, things that happened. A Warden, a Grey Warden. Duncan. Sadness assosciated with Duncan. Tower, mage, templars. Fear. Fear of templars. Fear of magic, fear of Fade, fear of demons. It made her skull ache, so she tried to stop thinking about it. Time enough to remember later.  
>"Nng..." she moaned, testing out her voice. It sounded strange, scratchy and disused.<p>

"Oh! Are you awake?" The voice was heavily accented, and it came from a shadowy form in a corner of the tent. Thel didn't recognise the words, they were in some Shemlen language. She tried to speak, to tell the shem to go away, but all that came out was another moan.  
>"I see. Mmf to you too, my dear. I do hope this means you're feeling better." The shadow unfolded itself, becoming tall and thin. It stepped forward into the light of the lantern, and Thel felt a relief that she couldn't explain. He had long hair the color of straw, and hazel eyes. He was an elf, not a shem. And he was smirking.<br>"Zevran..." she breathed, knowing it was the right name. '_Zevran? Who- oh. Oh. __Zevran__. Alistair, Morrigan, Wynne. Shale, Sten, Leliana, Zevran._' More memories flooded her mind, disorienting but satisfying. She knew who she was, where she was. Camp. The fight- the bet- oh, no. "Zevran?"  
>And suddenly he was there, kneeling, one hand stroking her hair softly, the other holding her own. "Shhh, my love, don't talk. Wynne will be here soon with more poultice."<br>"Is.. everyone...?"  
>"They're fine, everyone's fine. Morrigan has a couple minor scrapes, but they're superficial. Sten's concussion is healing fine. It's you I've... we've all been worried about."<br>Thel looked up into his face, taking in the dark sleep circles under his eyes, the way his hair was sticking in several directions. The rumpled state of his clothes. She reached her free hand up to his cheek, brushing it lightly, noting the stubble there. He closed his eyes for a moment, breathing softly for ten seconds of vulnerability before pulling away, composure regained. She dropped her hand and assumed a businesslike manner.  
>"Damage report?"<br>"Sten broke another sword, Alistair's left shoulderplate could use some beating back into shape. Nothing major."  
>"Where are we?"<br>"A day's forced march from the area of the fight, up against a cliff. There's good cover here, and we're downwind from any darkspawn, according to your fellow warden. Clever, no?"  
>"Yes," Thel smiled, "Quite clever. Now, take your clever self and get me some food."<br>"Ah, there it is. I wondered where it went." He sighed dramatically, putting on a martyred face.  
>"Where what went?"<br>"The Warden. These past few days, you've been The Damsel, The Injured, The Oh-Zevran-save-Me-"  
>"Watch it."<br>"Pardon. I'm a little rusty. But, the point is, you haven't been the Warden. Now, you are again."  
>"And?"<br>"And what?" He grinned at her, a picture of innocence.  
>"And <em>what does that mean?<em>"  
>"Nothing of consequence, my dear, nothing of consequence. I seem to remember something about food...? That is still an order?"<br>She glared at him, half-pouting, half-serious, for a moment before relenting. "Yes, get me food, you twit. Before I decide to set you on fire and have barbecued elf in stead of whatever mush Alistair's serving today."  
>"Alright, alright, I am nothing if not obedient to your... <em>appetite<em>, my warden." the elf smirked, rising and stretching luxuriously.  
>She threw a nearby pillow at him, but he dodged nimbly and ducked out of the tent, still grinning.<p>

Much later in the day, Thel was helped up by Wynne and Leliana. She managed to hobble outside, using them as support, and sat near the fire. Even Sten joined them at dinner, the whole group laughing and insulting Alistair's cooking. Thel beckoned Morrigan over, and nervously tried to apologised for the whole ordeal, but the witch was having none of it.  
>"It was all in good fun, and as the most harm was done to yourself... I do not think that what you are attempting is necessary. Relax and recuperate, my friend. No one holds you accountable."<br>Thel was moved nearly to tears, and managed to hold them back only by virtue of Alistair falling off of his log and causing her to laugh until it hurt. As the evening wore on, she became increasingly tired, in a comfortable sort of way. Wynne had Alistair help her back to her tent, and she fell asleep as soon as her head touched the soft bedroll. No nightmares plagued her, no half-remembered scraps of life before the circle or vivid recollections of life within it.

This was her family, now.


End file.
